


When All You Have Is A Hammer...

by Tamoline



Category: Carmilla (Web Series)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-07
Updated: 2015-05-03
Packaged: 2018-02-28 13:07:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 15,620
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2733737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tamoline/pseuds/Tamoline
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wherein Carmilla stalks Danny and Danny has no idea why.</p>
<p>Maybe she'll even get to find out before Carmilla manages to drive her around the bend.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, at the moment this is gen and about the relationship between Danny and Carmilla. I'm just winding the characters up and letting them go, so who knows where this is going to end.

Danny finally stops pretending that the amount of times she’s happened across Carmilla over the last week could be a coincidence when Kirsch, of all people, comments on it.

“Hey,” he says, nudging at her arm. “Scary Hottie’s over the way. Do you think we should go and say hello? She might think that we’re avoiding her if we don’t this time.”

I *am* avoiding her, Danny thinks but doesn’t say. Ever since the start of the spring term. Just the thought of going over there and saying something - anything - twists a knife in her guts. She may be mostly over Laura - she’s getting there if nothing else, she *is* - but there’re some things she still avoiding for her sanity’s sake. And Carmilla - with absolutely nothing between them except Laura - is definitely one of them.

“Sure,” she says. “Give her my regards,.” She manages to force her smile into something vaguely resembling apologetic. Hopefully it’s enough for Kirsch. “I’ve just remembered that I’ve got to go over the lesson plan for this afternoon again. A TA’s work is never done,” she adds then walks quickly off in a manner that she hopes doesn’t look too much like she’s fleeing.

She can practically feel Carmilla’s eyes boring into her back as she leaves.

* * * * *

So, she finally thinks later, when she’s able to, buffered by an afternoon’s classes and a couple of pints of beer bought from the campus bar; Carmilla’s following me, for reason or reasons unknown. She takes another swallow of the beer in front of her, swallowing quickly to avoid as much of the taste as she can. It may be cheap and nasty, not to mention the dark rumour about what exactly goes into it that the university can afford to sell it at such a price, but it gets the job done without putting too big a hole in her budget.

Maybe I’m just her next victim, she thinks wryly, lips twisting a little. After all, it’s not like her Mother Dearest is organising the blood supply these days.

No, she thinks, her mood souring, I’m not that lucky.

“You know what they say about drinking alone, Giant Redwood?” purrs a familiar voice from next to her and she freezes.

For a moment she thinks about just abandoning the dregs of her drink and *running*, but some shred of pride stops her. Fine, she thinks, turning towards the interloper. If she wants to push me this far, I can handle anything she can dish out.

“No,’ she says, smiling tightly. “But I’m sure that you’ll be glad to tell me.” She makes no effort to rein in the hostility in her voice.

Carmilla’s expression is its usual combination of boredom and detached amusement, but her eyes are unreadable, and something about her posture shifts slightly as she studies Danny silently for a moment. “Buy a girl a drink?” she finally says and the seeming non sequitur forces a laugh from Danny.

“Okay,” she says, curiosity about where this is going overcoming the tension knotting her gut. She orders another beer. “You probably want to read the warning before drinking, though,” she adds, nodding towards the poster on the wall.

Carmilla’s eyes track back and forth before she smirks and takes a drink.

“Wait,” Danny says. “You can actually read that?” That the poster, yellow and cracked, actually contains a health warning has been a cross between passed down student lore and an in-joke for as far as anyone Danny’s talked to knows, and that includes professors who went here twenty years ago. *No one* knows what the poster actually says, or even what language it’s in.

Apart from, of course, Carmilla, who just sits there and smirks, and says, “It’s actually quite funny.”

Danny gives her a narrow-eyed look, which just causes Carmilla’s lips to curve more, before she takes another sip of her beer and makes a face. “On second thoughts,” she says. “This isn’t fit to drown rats in.” She slams the glass down hard enough that beer slops over the side. “Buy a girl a *better* drink next time,” she advises, getting to her feet and swaying her way to the exit before Danny has a chance to formulate a response, let alone ask *what* next time?

What the hell, is all Danny can think. What the hell *was* that?

* * * * *

Quite possibly an attempt to drive her insane is Danny’s conclusion the next day after archery practise.

The whispering starts as she’s lining up to take her shots. It’s excited, verging on the high pitched in some cases, but she’s far too professional to look around until she’s placed all her arrows, most into the yellow with a few straying into the red. Only then does she lower her bow and look around to see what’s caused the flurry of interest.

As if her sinking stomach hasn’t already provided an answer.

It is, of course, Carmilla, watching the practise with her usual laconic expression. Who else could provoke her sisters of the Summer Society into such a display, she thinks with a certain degree of resignation.

Not that she doesn’t deserve it, after the basement, but…

It’s kind of awful, but Danny would just prefer not to think about it. Any of it. Not while, despite her best efforts, it still feels so raw.

“Hey,” Hannah says, nudging her unsubtly. “Isn’t that your *friend*, Carmilla?” Her expression makes it all too clear about why she thinks Carmilla’s here, and Danny has to suppress a groan. Hannah has been the chief proponent of Danny ‘getting back on the horse’ after the whole Laura disaster and Danny can appreciate that she’s trying to help, she can, even if she really would prefer that Hannah and the other girls would give her some more space…

But not Carmilla. No. And she has absolutely no desire to go through the prime reason about why Carmilla is such an unsuitable candidate for Hannah to throw Danny at because she’s fairly sure that will kick off such an unholy shitstorm of drama that her head just aches thinking about it.

She loves her sisters - she does - but just the thought of what she allowed them to get swept up into when Laura asked for help searching the university, the way that Danny let her anger get the better of her, sends a deep pulse of shame through her.

It’s not alright. None of it is. But there’s so way she can explain this to Hannah and the others, and she feels so tired just at the thought of trying.

So she just smiles and says, “Looks like it. Now are you planning on trying to beat my score or not?” and gives a sigh of relief when Hannah, competitive as ever, takes her bait and starts lining up her own shot.

Still, Carmilla’s presence weighs on her mind like an anchor, drawing her attention like a fixed point and every time she looks around Carmilla is looking back in her direction.

What does she want, Danny can’t help thinking. She had thought she’d known - had thought she’d had some idea, at the very least - but after last night?

She just doesn’t know anymore, and Carmilla’s an itch that she can’t help wanting to scratch.

Which is why it’s all the more frustrating when, after she packs up at the end of practise, she looks up to find that Carmilla’s disappeared.

Crazy. The woman’s trying to make her crazy.

* * * * *

There’s a knock at her door and Danny just looks up int time to see Hannah and Chloe push their way into her room.

“A group from the Summer Soc were going to a party tonight, and we wondering…” Hannah trails off, eyes just a little too bright and hopeful to be completely unforced. It’s almost a little painful to see. Hannah’s not stupid - far from it - but she’s always been uncomplicated with little in the way of a brain to mouth filter.

At least that’s how she used to be. Now they’ve all got things that they can’t, won’t, don’t talk about. Ever since the night in the basement. There’s a brittle tension running through the Summer Society these days, and Danny has no idea about what to do about it. What she can do about it.

She’s just flailing in the dark, and it scares her, makes her mad even as she has no focus to direct the anger at.

She just does what she can and hopes for the best.

So she returns an equally false smile and says, “Sure.”

Who knows? Maybe it will help her as well.

* * * * *

“Hey down there,” Kirsch says, towering above Danny in the only way he can - when she’s sitting down and he’s standing, “Want to get up and dance?”

“Sure,” she says, for oh so many reasons. Because engaging in the party, however nominally, might actually get Hannah and the rest off her back. Because Kirsch is only here because she asked him to be. Because she’d do anything to help wipe away the shadows lurking behind his eyes, if only briefly. Because, to be honest, she still can’t get rid of the lurking fear that Carmilla is going to materialise out of the darkness like some kind of demon at any moment. Even if she hasn’t seen hide nor hair of her for several days, ever since archery practise, and fretting about it even more just seems pointless.

It’s almost enough to make a girl go over to Carmilla’s dorm, just to get it over with. Almost.

And maybe she gets up to dance because she might actually have some fun, though the prospect seems a distant possibility at best.

Danny’s never been the best at dancing, but Kirsch manages to make that feel alright as he’s just as bad. Between them they manage a kind of dorky rhythm that has her perpetually about one second away from cracking up. From what she can see of Kirsch’s face in the semi-darkness, he’s feeling the same way.

Which is good. Can only be good. He doesn’t talk about his feelings, but having two people so close to him die recently - one of them partly responsible for the other’s death even - she can’t even imagine. And he’s been such a rock for her, a refuge away from the well intentioned meddling of her sisters. And the fact that he’s almost as eager to avoid the subject of Carmilla as she is doesn’t hurt.

She can only hope that she’s helping him too.

She sees Hannah give her an exaggerated wink as she passes and Danny has to resist the urge to roll her eyes. But Hannah’s the reason she’s here and maybe her dancing with Kirsch will provide some distraction at least. She’s fairly certain that she’ll be hearing about it for days regardless.

“Mind if I cut in?” asks a familiar voice and of course, of *course*, Carmilla’s looking at Kirsch when she asks that question.

Kirsch looks at Danny and she can see the question in his eyes. She smiles and shrugs. Might as well get this over with. Whatever the hell ‘this’ is. Kirsch steps back and points towards the nearest wall, clearly indicating where he’ll be if she needs him. It’d be almost sweet if she was that kind of girl.

Camilla steps in and, despite being almost a full foot shorter than Danny, effortlessly takes the lead. And Carmilla is, because of course she is, a good dancer, even if she does dance to her own unheard beat. She even manages to make Danny feel almost halfway competent, which is a feat in and of itself, and a kindness Danny wouldn’t have expected of her. If she’d been asked before this, she’d have assumed that Carmilla would have taken the opportunity to make her feel like a clumsy giant.

“Okay,” she asks, breathing heavily, about five minutes later when Carmilla decides to take a pause. “What the hell is this?”

“What is what?” Camilla asks, smirking, because naturally she is going to make this as hard for Danny as possible.

Danny gestures between them. “You. Coming to find me. Repeatedly.”

“Maybe I just felt like dancing this evening.”

Danny gives her a hard look, because she has a hard time believing that Carmilla would have problems getting Laura to join her.

“Ever thought that I might just like you?” Camilla asks, deadpan.

“How about ‘No, not really’?” Danny replies.

“Well too bad, Everest, because that’s the only answer you’re going to get. Now, have you recovered enough yet for another dance, or should I let you catch your breath a while longer?” Camilla asks, looking up at her with a challenging glint in her eyes.

Crazy. The woman is going drive her crazy. And possibly already has, because Danny finds herself rising to Carmilla’s bait. “Ready if you are, short-arse.”

She’d never have believed that interacting with Carmlla might actually be *fun*.


	2. Chapter 2

Danny’s on the way back to her room after an early run the next morning when she almost runs into someone as she rounds the corner of the corridor. It’s Hannah, her expression completely blank, affectless. It could just be that she’s tired or hungover, but something twists unsettlingly in Danny’s stomach.

“Hey,” she says as Hannah starts to move past her. “Everything alright?”

Hannah doesn’t stop. Doesn’t speed up, either, but doesn’t stop. “Fine,” she says, and her voice is dead calm for all that it is still roughened with sleep. “Completely fine.”

Danny is about to go after her when Chloe comes around the corner in hot pursuit, looking like she threw on something in a hurry, a worried expression on her face.

Maybe Danny’ll have better luck here.

“Anything wrong with Hannah?” she asks.

Chloe stops dead in her tracks. For a moment she looks like she’s going to say something before her face twists in fury. “You!” she almost hisses. “This is all your fault. Just because you’re a goddamn hero…”

Danny’s mind stutters for a few moments, stuck like it’s trying to change gear, and it can’t, it can’t, it can’t. And by the time she can blink and force herself into action, by the time she can even think of saying, “I’m not a hero,” Chloe’s long gone, trailing after Hannah.

There’s nothing to be done now. She’ll catch up with them later, see if there’s anything she can do.

She just wishes that the curdling of her stomach didn’t tell her that she’s not as sure she can help as she should be.

* * * * *

Danny’s making notes for a paper when Carmilla walks into her room without so much as a by-your-leave. 

“What do you think you’re doing?” Danny asks as she gets to her feet so she can tower over the intruder. Not that it would help her, if it actually came down to it, but the extra inches make her feel a little better.

“I’m sorry,” Carmilla says with silken sarcasm. “I thought barging in without knocking is the way things are done in the twenty-first century.”

Danny tries to glare at her, but feels her mouth twitch instead. “What do you want?”

“Maybe I just felt like hanging with my bro,” she says, and Carmilla infuses the word with such scorn that the twitch becomes a fully fledged smile, however reluctant.

“Really?” Danny says, sitting down again. “Bro? *That’s* what you’re going with?”

“That’s what your pet neanderthal calls you, isn’t it?” Carmilla says and Danny’s about to defend Kirsch when Carmilla smoothly continues. “Bonds of battle and all that. We share that much, don’t we?” she asks and Danny suddenly can’t think of anything but that confused melee, of Carnilla and that sword and…

And…

And…

“Yeah,” she manages, her lips feeling a little numb. “I guess we share that much.”

“Good,” Carmilla says and walks over to the bed. “Glad that’s settled.” She grabs Danny’s pillow and props it up against the wall, looks at it for a moment, then rearranges Danny’s (nice, thick) duvet to create a small nest for herself, before settling herself down into it.

Danny probably should protest, but… But Carmilla’s right. They fought together, and Carmilla’s a hero. She deserves at least this much.

And maybe it’ll help distract her from worrying about Hannah, who she still hasn’t managed have a talk with.

What she still can’t figure out is *why*. Why is Carmilla here? Why is she trying to… to befriend Danny? She’d say it’s part of some nefarious plot, but she just can’t imagine Carmilla caring that much, having the motivation to carry out any kind of complicated plan, nefarious or otherwise.

“So,” she says. “What do you want to talk about?” Because Danny’s clean out of ideas.

Carmilla cracks a slight smirk. “Talk about? Gingerbread, I think you really overestimate how compelling I find conversing with you. Going to eat that?” she drawls, nodding towards the pomegranate currently resting on Danny’s desk. 

Danny’s hand curls around it, reflexes born of a year spent with a food-stealing roommate kicking in without even having to think about it. “Hands off, dead girl. Besides. I didn’t think you ate… fruit.”

“Nah, you’re thinking of Laura,” Carmilla says dryly. “Didn’t answer my question.”

“It’s for a friend,” Danny says. “So, if you’re not here to talk, why *are* you here?”

“Me? I’m here to read,” she says, producing a book from seemingly nowhere and flicking through it to a page. 

Here to read. Danny can’t help staring at her until she looks up again and makes a flicking motion. “As you were, Everest,” and Danny starts before turning back to her desk and does her best to concentrate on her paper, trying her best to ignore her uninvited guest.

Which would be a lot easier if said guest didn’t persist in making occasional comments about the books that she’s studying. Not generally germane to subject of the paper, true, but the fact that they’re almost always interesting and takes on the matter that she hadn’t considered irritate Danny almost as much as they intrigue her.

They certainly do nothing to help her write her damn coursework.

Finally she pushes her laptop away and turns around to glare at the miscreant currently stretched out on her bed. “Why don’t *you* take this course if you’ve got so many thoughts on it?”

Camilla doesn’t even do her the courtesy of looking up. “Already done it. This isn’t exactly my first go around, remember.”

Danny rolls her eyes. “Like I could forget. Just how many doctorates do you have on your resume, anyway?”she asks, half because she’s curious and the picture of Carmilla studiously working on her thesis is far too easy to imagine, and half because it doesn’t look like she’s getting any work done here this afternoon anyway and the impulse to try and dig a little beneath Carmilla’s flawlessly bored exterior is just too tempting to resist.

What she isn’t quite expecting is a slightly too long pause followed by Carmilla saying with just a little too much bored affectation, “None, actually. Maman didn’t believe in anything that would leave that much of a record.”

And Danny’s just not sure what to do with that. If she knew Carmilla better - if they were actually friends - she might have some idea about how to navigate *that* minefield. If they were still in a state of barely concealed enmity that they’d spent much of the last term in… well, Carmilla probably wouldn’t be here and if she was… well, Danny is honest enough with herself to admit that she might well have ungently prodded just to get a reaction.

But here, now, she’s just not sure what to say in response or whether she should just change the subject.

She must pause too long because the next thing she knows Carmilla is off the bed and heading for the door. “Later,” she says blandly. “Do try not to brain yourself on any inconvenient doorframes.”

And this, this Danny can deal with. Out of all the things that have happened today, this Danny can deal with. “Try not to walk into any sunlight and sparkle,” she retorts and just grins when Carmilla flips her the finger on her way out.

* * * * *

She finally manages to pin Hannah down later that evening. Hannah answers her door and Danny can almost see the excuses start to form on her lips, about how she has work to do, about how she’s tired, about how she’d really love to talk right now but…

Danny pre-empts them all by tossing her the pomegranate, Hannah’s favourite fruit. Half bribe to get in the door - Hannah’s never been able to resist them - and half just in attempt to make her smile. It works, though she can still see the wariness in Hannah’s eyes.

“Heya,” she says, as casually as she can, and waits to see how this is going to play out.

Hannah digs her thumbnail into the pomegranate and Danny finds herself unable to stop watching, barely able to breath, the merest trace of red, red, red from welling out of the oddly bloodless wound in the skin of the…

Of the pomegranate. The pomegranate, she reminds herself and manages to break the spell by dragging her eyes upwards to meet the gaze of Hannah and she’s finally able to breathe again.

The moment weighs heavily between them, and Danny finds herself wanting to say something, anything, to breach the wall of silence about what happened in the basement of the Lustig…

But she can’t. This isn’t about her. She can’t let it become about that. This is about Hannah.

Who cakes a smile on her lips that doesn’t reach her eyes. “So,” she says in an affectedly casual voice. “I heard that *Carmilla* has been spending time in your room.” Her smile becomes more natural as she continues. “Just the two of you, all by yourselves,” she adds in a tone that’s far too suggestive for Danny’s liking.

“Nothing happened!” Danny says in a tone that she realises too late sounds a tad too defensive.

Hannah’s smile widens. “So you’d have liked something to happen.”

There is no winning move here that she can see, so she just raises her eyebrows at Hannah. “You really are disturbingly invested in my lack of a love life, aren’t you?”

Hanna shrugs. “Or at least in rectifying that sorry state of affairs.”

“Thanks,” Danny says sardonically. “Look,” she continues in a more subdued tone, “If there’s ever anything you need to talk about, anything at all, you know my door’s always open.”

Haanah’s face freezes, the humour going out of it. “I’m fine,” she says. “I don’t know what Chloe’s told you…”

“Nothing,” Danny interjects. Apart from that it’s all her fault. “She’s told me nothing.”

“That’s because there’s nothing to say,” Hannah says then closes the door in Danny’s face.

Well that went well, Danny reflects. She contemplates knocking on Hannah’s door again, but she can’t imagine it would do any good at this point.

She’ll just have to wait.

Maybe there’s something she can do so that she won’t be so damn useless.

Maybe.

* * * * *

“Goodbye,” Danny says to Carmilla’s back as she exits Danny’s room. “Goodbye, Danny,” she mutters to herself. “Why, thank you Carmilla for exhibiting some manners when imposing yourself on my room. That’s no problem, Danny. I may be a three hundred plus year old corpse, but that doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten basic human courtesies.”

Camilla has apparently decided that she likes lounging around Danny’s room of an evening, given that this is the third time in the last couple of weeks she’s turned up unannounced and proceed to squat on Danny’s bed for an hour or so before disappearing off again.

It’s honestly surprising that Danny has found herself not minding the intrusions that much. It’s certainly more than she would have expect last term. Maybe it’s the challenge of trying to figure out exactly what the hell Carmilla’s game is.

She has serious problems believing that it’s because Carmilla’s developed a sudden craving for her company.

And it hasn’t been as painful as she would have thought. More of a dull ache than anything else.

“I’ve heard that talking to yourself is never a good sign,” Carmilla whispers from just behind her, so close she can feel the dry breath on the back of her neck, and Danny yelps embarrassingly loudly as she jumps, managing to bash her thighs on her desk.

“What the hell?” she says. “I thought you’d left to do whatever it is you do when you’re not sucking the blood from virgins.”

“Did,” she replies. “Decided to pop back for a moment when I heard your pitiful cry for help.”

“For the record,” she says, rubbing her probably bruised flesh whilst trying to retain some measure of dignity. “You do not have permission to enter my room through your sneaky vampire methods.”

“I’ll have to remember to specifically ignore that in the future,” Carmilla says as she walks to the door. Again. This time, though, she stops in the doorway. “I take my leave of you for now, my beloved,” she says, executing an elegant curtsey before closing the door behind her.

“I really hate you sometimes,” Danny groans as she collapses back into her chair and buries her face in her arms. God knows what Hannah and the others are going to make of *that* little proclamation.

Danny would be entirely unsurprised if that was at least half the reasoning behind Carmilla doing it.

Still, at least the evening’s… weirdness is out of the way and done with.

Which is why she’s more than a little dumbfounded when the door opens again less than half an hour later to reveal Carmilla and… a plate?

“Here,” she says, sliding it onto the desk in front of Danny.

It’s pie. To be exact, taking a sniff, it smells like *cafeteria* pie. She takes an explanatory nibble and lets the rich flavour melt across her mouth.

Definitely cafeteria pie. She hasn’t had the heart to go down and get some ever since she and Laura… didn’t do that anymore.

“Do I even want to know how you managed to smuggle this out?” she asks before taking another mouthful. She’s heard the legends of students who have tried that before.

It’s never ended well.

“Probably not,” Carmilla replies in bored tone, leafing through yet another book. At some point, Danny’s really got to find out how she manages to hide them on her person.

Maybe she has some kind of TARDIS-like pocket in her jacket or something.

She’s on her last bite of pie before the thought strikes her. Is Carmilla *actually* trying to woo her? It’s hard to believe. She saw how she and Laura were looking at each other at the end of last term and *surely* those kind of feelings couldn’t have subsided in bare few months since she’s really seen them.

But.

It isn’t as though she knows for certain that they’re still together. And meeting over pie was the thing she and Laura as they… well, as they weren’t actually going anywhere as it turns out, but still. And Carmilla has been hanging around a lot.

What if her Summer Society sisters are actually right? What if Carmilla’s sardonic proclamation of a little over half an hour ago wasn’t quite as sardonic as it seemed? Or at least concealing a hidden truth within its sarcasm?

What if Carmilla actually is pursuing her?

Now that the questions have wriggled their way into her brain, she can’t help turning around to just look at Carmilla as she sits reading on her bed. She’s not quite sure what to make of the idea. It isn’t as though she’s ever denied - even to herself - that Carmilla is exactly hard on the eyes. And, well, Danny’s never actually had the experience of being the pursued rather than the pursuer., or at least pursued by someone she might like. 

It might actually be nice, for once.

A warm feeling wriggles its way into her stomach.

“Something amusing, beanpole?” Camilla asks, glancing up from her book and to her horror Danny realises she’s smiling.

“No,” she says spinning back around and staring as hard as she can at her paper.

She needs more information.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: There may be some angst ahead. Also some, ahem, visceral descriptions.

The resolution to actually do something to find that information - like talk to Perry or LaFontaine or, worse, Laura - lasts until she actually starts thinking about it the next morning. Starting up a conversation just to talk about Carmilla with, well, *any* of them would just be too awkward, especially after all this time. And it’s not really necessary. Camilla hasn’t *really* done anything to indicate that she’s interested in Danny in any other way than an occasional chew toy. 

As soon as Danny stops wriggling quite so entertainingly she’ll probably move on.

Still Danny can’t quite stop herself cataloguing Carmilla’s looks and glances, the sardonically amused ones when she thinks Danny’s made a fool of herself, the slow, almost sensual, ones when she’s aware that Danny’s looking at her - undoubtedly just to get a rise out of her - and the occasional quick, considering ones that Danny sometimes manages to catch out of the corner of her eyes. Carmilla’s words and tone are of no help whatsoever, of course, so smooth and polished that Danny half wonders if Carmilla even knows what she’s saying half the time or if she’s just following some script Danny isn’t privy to.

Danny tries - and fails - to convince herself that none of it matters, matters at all. But - for all their mutual bickering - Carmilla brings with her a stillness, a calm, a balm that Danny can’t find anywhere else these days and can’t quite bring herself to disturb by questioning too deeply. And if Laura is between them, for all that Danny never mentions her, Carmilla never seems to bring her up either.

* * * * *

Danny’s late, late, late and is using a short cut that involves cutting through the bushes just outside her dorm that she swears shaves a couple of all too necessary minutes off her transit time even if it does, rather appropriately, leave her looking like she’s been dragged through a bush backwards when she comes across a small curled up form, back pressed against the wall of the dorm, head tucked in between their legs as if effort of will alone can make them disappear.

It takes Danny a moment before she recognises Chloe. Chloe who has been politely distant ever since the incident in the hallway, maybe even before. Chloe whose prickly pride almost undoubtedly doesn’t want Danny, of all people, here right now. 

Danny gives one last wistful glance in the direction of her class before she squats down near to her.

She might be unwelcome right now, but she can’t just do *nothing*. That’s never been her way. She’s got to at least try.

“Hey,” she says softly.

Chloe huddles in on herself all the tighter by way of response, but Danny can still hear the soft hitch of quiet crying.

She’s so, so bad at this.

“Look,” she says, shuffling over until her back’s planted against the wall next to Chloe. “I’m just going to sit here for a while. Not that you have to say anything, but I’m here if you want someone to talk to.” She reaches inside her bag and gets out the text for the class she’s undoubtedly going to miss now. She might as well get a start on her catchup.

It takes five minutes before Chloe break the silence. “I don’t know what to do,” she whispers and Danny drops her book, focussing her attention on the person next to her.

“What do you mean?” she asks, almost as quietly.

There’s a pause and for a moment Danny thinks that’s all she’s going to be able to get out of her, before Chloe says, “Hannah.”

Danny considers for a beat whether or not a strategic hand on the back would help or just get the offending appendage bitten off before deciding not to risk it, at least for the moment. “Do you want to talk about it?” she offers cautiously.

Chloe’s arms tighten around her knees before she finally replies. “Sometimes she’s just not there,” she says then quickly follows it up with, “Nightmares too, and sometimes even flashbacks, but I feel like I know what to do when those happen. But the times when she just goes blank,” she starts shaking again, and Danny can’t help wrapping an arm around her. “Like she doesn’t even know what emotion *is*… I don’t know how to deal with that.” She doesn’t flinch away, maybe even leans in a little.

“You don’t have to deal with this alone,” Danny says quietly. “Neither does she.”

Neither Chloe nor Hannah are the first to have… problems with what happened that night below the Lustig building. Not the first that Danny’s tried to help. Even if she can’t help feeling like she’s not nearly as good at this as she should be. Even if she can’t help feeling like she’s being stretched thinner and thinner, like she should almost be able to hold her hand up and see light shining through.

But she doesn’t have an option. This is her fault, and she has to do the best she can.

‘Who are we going to talk to?” Chloe asks bitterly, lifting her tear stained face for the first time. “You? You honestly think Hannah’s going to admit to… to anything in front of the *good* and *noble* Danny Lawrence who she already feels like she failed by freezing when lives were on the line?” She laughs sharply. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

Danny bites the inside of her mouth until the coppery-sharp taste of blood fills her mouth, until the wave of self-loathing passes enough that she can speak again. “I’m hardly a paragon,” she mutters.

“Oh, you don’t have to tell me that,” Chloe says. “It’s your fault that we were down there in the first place. Your fault that I’m left looking after Hannah and putting the pieces back together as best I can. Your fault that I-,” she bites off suddenly, swallowing the rest of what she was going to say and gets to her feet, flinching away from Danny’s arm. “Your fault,” she almost hisses before marching off.

Danny just sits there for a while, looking off into the distance. Her fault. Well, Chloe’s not wrong. She sighs then gets to her own feet. It isn’t as though she has an option except to keep on going, though, doing the best she can.

Stopping would just be another failure, and she hasn’t any more room for those.

* * * * *

“The blue folder on top of the bedside cabinet,” Danny says from the safety of the desk. Camilla, sprawled out on the bed, book in hand, moves nothing not an inch except to raise an eyebrow. “It’s for you.”

“Be still my beating heart,” Carmilla says dryly. “Oh. Wait.” But she still lazily leans over, grabs the folder and starts flicking through it. She looks up sharply, her facade of disinterest pierced for once. “Doctoral programs?” she says.

“Do you honestly want to waste your time with another undergraduate degree?” Danny asks, failing to hide the smile spreading over her face, not trying all that hard, really.

Carmilla just looks at her wordlessly, a raw quality in her eyes that Danny’s never seen before.

“I know an imp in Administration,” Danny continues. “She’s managed to find copies of some of your previous degrees. And for only a small bribe, she’s willing to doctor the dates.”

Camilla moves so quickly she’s almost a blur, until she’s towering over Danny in the only way she can - up close and personal whilst she is standing and Danny is sitting. She looks down at Danny with eyes so dark, standing so still, that the air is thick in Danny’s throat as she looks back up at her. She feels paralysed as she waits for Carmilla to… to do anything to break this moment.

Which apparently is to abruptly pivot back around to face the bed before striding over to it and lying down, back towards Danny.

Danny can suddenly breath again, and tells herself that she isn’t disappointed, she *isn’t*, and calls over towards the bed, “You’re welcome!”

By way of response, Carmilla flicks her middle finger up at her, but she spoils the studied indifference she is obviously trying so hard to project by twisting her head around so she can just about see Danny and there is something that almost, *almost*, could be called a smile on her lips which Danny takes as the only thanks she’s likely to get, so she turns back around to brush up on the notes for the next lecture of the course she’s TAing.

Carmilla’s less talkative than usual and she keeps throwing Danny these quick, almost uncertain glances whenever she thinks Danny isn’t looking. It’s different, and Danny is nowhere near fluent enough in Carmilla to be certain whether this is a good or bad different, and tries her best to ignore the twisting in her guts at the thought that she might just have messed this up.

Still, when Carmilla goes, the folder disappears with her and Danny tells herself that this is enough. It has to be enough.

* * * * *

When Hannah finally talks to Danny - actually talks, rather than evading by asking her about unwelcome topics like Carmilla - Danny has to admit it’s a bit of a surprise.

For one thing, Hannah comes to see her. 

That Danny really doesn’t see coming.

Her first warning is when, in response to a knock on her door, she has to actually answer it rather than Hannah coming blithely in without waiting for a response. The second is that, rather than meet her eyes, Hannah looks briefly away. She’s about to jokingly ask who died - which is possibly bad move on Silas campus, but some old habits die hard - when Hannah quietly asks, “Can I come in a moment?”

Danny blinks, thrown and Hannah looks like she’s considering bolting, but thankfully Danny manages to catch herself, saying, “Sure,” and stepping back into her room. She can’t stop her pulse starting to race or palms becoming slightly clammy though. Despite the fact that she’s made this exact offer multiple times to multiple people - she *had* to, it was all her fault in the first place - this is the first time anyone’s taken her up on it, and she can’t help finding herself far more unprepared than she’d like. “Would you like something to drink?” she blurts out.

Hannah gives her a raised eyebrow. “Well, sure. A beer if you’ve got one.”

Danny automatically goes to look in her mini-fridge, but *of course* there’s nothing there except half a pint of milk for her breakfast cereal. This doesn’t stop her from poking around under her bed just in case a can has magically managed to appear from somewhere. “Uh, sorry,” she says, looking up at Hannah and giving her best attempt at a smile. “Seem to be out.”

The thing is, she doesn’t know why she’s so freaked out by this. She’s faced honest-to-god *vampires* in battle and, well, she didn’t have any problems at the time. The odd bad dream later, but she’s far from alone in that. But this, *this*, is causing her to have problems in keeping her breathing regular and she doesn’t know *why*.

But at least her acting like a complete nitwit has had one salutary effect - Hannah’s now leaning against the wall, posture relaxed, looking like she’s having problems not laughing at Danny’s antics.

Arse.

But with that something inside Danny relaxes and she can breath again. “So,” she says, bouncing up on her knees just high enough that she can perch on the edge of the bed. “What can I do for you?”

The half smile on Hannah’s face disappears, but she doesn’t look as on edge as she did when Danny first saw her at the door. “You said that I could talk to you if I needed to?”

Danny nods. Here it is.

“I’m worried about Chloe,” Hannah says in a burst.

Oh. Okay.

“Ever since the… thing, she’s…” Hannah looks down. “It wasn’t like the movies. They may have been vampires, but they looked like humans.” Her voice drops to a whisper. “Chloe says driving a stake into one felt nothing like she thought it would.”

“No,” Danny says, a little numbly. “It doesn’t.” Danny can attest to that. Can still almost feel the slick meat as it slid and slipped under the point of her stake, skidding off exposed guts rather than digging in, can remember the wood slipping, blood-slick, out of her hand as the girl, no, the *vampire* screamed and twisted away despite being almost buried by Zeta boys and Summer girls. Can remember the twitching after she finally managed to drive it home.

Can remember Hannah joking on the way down that the best way to a vampire’s heart is through its stomach. Otherwise the ribcage gets in the way. Can remember finding out the truth of that statement the hard way.

Can remember throwing up that night until her vomit turned pea-green after what she’d done had finally hit home.

Hannah says something that sounds like it ends in a question and Dany jolts, realising that she’s not quite sure how much she’s missed. Hannah looks at her, obviously waiting for a response and Danny hazards a nod.

“The worst part is that she’s so *angry*,” Hannah says quietly, eyes shining, and Danny feels like shit because she has no idea exactly when that started. “Not that it’s all the time,” she adds quickly. “Not even most of the time. But at least when she’s crying I feel like I can do something about it. When she’s angry, all I can do is absorb it and… and…” She starts shaking and Danny hesitantly extends an arm which Hannah leans into.

“You don’t have to take that,” she says gently.

It’s a mistake. Hannah pulls away from her and Danny can already see her starting to shut down. “No,” she says. “You don’t understand. She did it, she staked that vampire for *me* and there is *no* way I’m letting her down.”

“No, no,” Danny says, waving her hands in negation. “I meant…” she searches for inspiration. “I meant you didn’t have to absorb it alone.” She attempts another smile. “Lord knows she’s angry enough at me.”

“I couldn’t do that,” Hannah says. “You don’t deserve that. I mean, it’s thanks to you we saved those girls and stopped this happening again.”

She doesn’t quite say ‘You’re a hero’, but Danny can see it in her eyes and feel her gorge rise.

Because she isn’t. She really, really isn’t.

“Well,” she says. “At least feel free to talk to me anytime you want, anytime it could help.”

“Apart from if Carmilla’s in here, I assume,” Hannah says, a weak smirk on her face. It’s not much of a joke, but Danny finds herself laughing anyway and Hannah joins in after a moment. And when she leaves, she seems to be a bit lighter.

It may not be much, but maybe Danny’s doing a little good. Hannah, at least, is talking to *someone* now.

* * * * *

“What the *hell* did you think you were doing?” Carmilla snarls as she blows into Danny’s room like an angry hurricane, the door banging against the wall.

“Excuse me?” Danny says, rising to her feet, blood starting to sing in her ears in anticipation of a fight.

Camilla slams the door shut behind her and then is suddenly pushing Danny against the wall. “What the *hell* did you think you were doing, pouring blood down the hole beneath the Lustig building?” Danny thinks briefly about denying everything, but Carmilla must read something of the sort in her face because she adds, “I’ve already had the story off your little friend in Zeta, so don’t even think about lying to me.”

Danny struggles briefly but Carmilla’s arm is pressed up against her chest, trapping her against the wall. “Why do you care?” she asks.

Carmilla’s eyes flash. “A better question is why did you? I would have thought that you’d have been more than happy to let my corpse rest down there.”

Danny looks away. “You would have thought.”

Carmilla’s arm relaxes against her, and Danny probably could push her away if she wanted to. She doesn’t. “Okay, Everest. Talk,” Carmilla says.

Danny shrugs. “There isn’t much to tell. I’d seen the old movies, seen Dracula brought back from the dead by blood spilled over his resting place. Thought it was worth a shot.”

“And it wasn’t like a dozen other vampires had died around there. Oh. Wait.”

Danny can’t help rolling her eyes a little. “And *that* was why I had Zeta Society standing around with tridents, just in case we got the wrong one back.”

“Do you have any idea,” Carmilla says, now more leaning against Danny than pushing against her, and Danny’s uncomfortably aware of Carmilla’s breasts pressed against her stomach. “What spilling your own, fresh blood into the pit of sacrifice to an ancient goddess could have done.”

Danny swallows. “The animal blood and the bagged blood hadn’t worked,” she says, a little hoarsely. “So I thought it might have to straight from the vein. It worked,” she adds defensively, though she can still remember the sickening feeling in her stomach when she’d thought that it hadn’t, that this whole trip had been for nothing, not even… when Kirsch had spotted a pale figure laying on an outcropping under where she’d spilled her blood.

“You idiot,” Carmilla breaths against her, somehow managing to make the words sound like far more of an endearment than they really had any right to be. She’s looking up at Danny now, so close that she could stand up on tiptoes… so close that Danny could just lean down and…

The moment lengthens, stretches out and Danny can’t help but crazily wonder what they, either of them, are waiting for.

But she can’t bring herself to break it and Carmilla seems disinclined to, so there they stand until Danny finds her mouth moving, almost of its own accord. “Why now?” it asks.

Camilla blinks and steps away, the spell broken. “Why what now?”

Danny swallows, not knowing whether to curse or bless her wilful mouth. “Why did you bring this up now? I’d thought we’d gotten away with it.”

Camilla looks at her, half lidded. “That story? Always thought there was something suspicious about it. Just didn’t… didn’t seem interesting until now.” She gives Danny a glare. “You’re an idiot. Don’t you even think about doing something like this again,” she says, then turns and walks out of the room.

Danny’s left staring into the distance, still able to feel the press of Carmilla’s body against hers, still able to smell the copperish scent of Carmilla’s breath.

Okay.

She *really* needs to know Carmilla’s state of play right now. For the sake of her sanity, if nothing else.

But despite the fact that she doesn’t know nearly enough yet, despite the fact that she tells herself again and again that she can’t let herself even hope just yet, she can’t help feeling a warm burn in her chest, like summer sun, when she thinks of Carmilla.

* * * * *

“Perry,” she says, because out of all the options available, Perry is by far the easiest to speak to.

“Danny,” Perry says, fluttering a little. “What a delight. I haven’t seen you in ages.”

As ever, Perry is far too polite to, say, mention that Danny has been avoiding them like the plague. Not that she’s really had any reason to go over to that dorm this term.

“How are you?” Danny asks. “How is everyone?”

“I’m fine,” Perry says. “Not that third year isn’t always a rush of too many things to do and too little time to do them even without a floor to look after, as I’m sure you know. LaFontaine,” she says, unable or unwilling to stop a sunny smile from crossing her lips at their name, “Is doing well in their studies. *When* they’re not poking into things better left undisturbed,” she adds a little primly. “Laura is, of course, right along side them. When she isn’t leading the charge of course.” She pauses for a moment, then says in a more gentle tone. “She and Carmilla seem to be very happy together. Well, except a few minor hiccups, but what relationship doesn’t have its ups and downs?”

Danny feels her expression freeze as the… the whatever it was inside her contracts into something black and solid and *dead*. She doesn’t even care that Perry’s face acquires a dreadful degree of solicitousness as she says, “Now I know I’m not necessarily the best advocate for this course of action, but sometimes the only way forward is to let these feelings go.”

Danny wants to laugh, wants to tell Perry that she’d be more than happy to if Carmilla would just leave her the hell alone, but instead she manages to say, “Thank you,” stiffly and leave before she… she does *something*.

* * * * *

Danny’s been staring at her computer screen blankly for an hour when Carmilla blows into the room like nothing, nothing at all is wrong. She at least has the grace to stop when she sees Danny’s expression. “What’s wrong, Redwood?” she asks, like she doesn’t know, like she isn’t the *cause* of all this.

“Why did you start all this?” Danny asks as levelly as she can. “Hanging around me. Turning up where I was. And don’t even think of giving me some bullshit evasive answer like you normally do.”

“I don’t know, Everest. Why do people normally spend time together?”

It’s Danny’s turn to advance on Carmilla, and she can feel the rage boiling underneath her skin, her hands almost itching with the need to… to *do* something. “Just. Answer. The. Goddamn. Question,” she grates. “And don’t even try to pretend that you sought me out because you liked me or wanted to be my friend. Just what game were you trying to play here?”

What game were you trying to play with me, she almost shrieks.

Camilla swallows and her eyes flick around nervously. “I wanted to get you speaking with Laura again,” she admits quietly. Her mouth keeps on moving after that, but Danny doesn’t hear anything past the white noise filling her ears.

This wasn’t about her. This had never been about her.

Camilla had just played her for a fool in some kind of sick game, twisted around her emotions until she’d do *anything* Carmilla asked or her, anything at all.

“Get out,” she said, remaining utterly stock still, doing the only thing she could think of to stop herself… doing something unfortunate. “Get the hell out, and don’t even *think* of ever coming back.”

As if by a miracle, Carmilla does exactly that, closing the door behind her.

And with her gone, Danny can finally breath again. She manages to make it over to the bed before she collapses on it, crying.

Of course this had never been about her. How could she have been stupid enough to think otherwise?


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this has taken so long to write - I've been suffering a severe lack of inspiration. *Hopefully* there should be one more part after this.

It’s three days later when the knock on her door comes. 

It hasn’t been the best three days of her life. It’s hurt - it’s hurt pretty much all the time, a dull background numbing pain that’s just lingered, that she doesn’t know what to do with - but she’d carried on, done her duties, completed her work, because what else is she going to do? She’s not quite sure she could give up, even if she wanted to. And at least no one’s mentioning Carmilla to her. Even Hannah, after one ill judged insinuation about what they must get up to in Danny’s room. Danny’s not quite sure what her expression was, but apparently it was enough to make Hannah flinch away and fall quiet.

Danny probably should feel bad about that, but she hasn’t quite managed to make herself get there just yet. She probably should be worried that no one’s come to her with any problems in the last few days, but she can’t quite care about that either.

She’s not sure how much of this is the whole… Carmilla thing. She’s not really sure it matters.

She’s carrying on, because that’s just what she does.

There’s another knock, quiet, hesitant, and she manages to motivate herself enough to get up. It must be important. It’s the first time anyone’s knocked on her door in three days. She runs a quick hand through her hair in a vague attempt to make it look presentable and opens the door.

It’s Laura, looking up at her with an almost embarrassed smile. “Hi,” she says.

A wave of deep shame rolls over her at the sight of Laura. Oh, Danny thinks as though at a distance, I can still feel that much.

“Hi,” she says. What do you want, she thinks but does not ask.

“Do you mind if I come in?” Laura asks. “Some of the looks I got on the way in makes me think that people might have been going for the tar and feathers.”

Danny blinks. “Sure,” she says and steps back.

Laura glances around the room as she enters. Anywhere, really, except at Danny herself. This is not precisely the way that Danny had envisaged Laura getting her first look of Danny’s place and she can’t help wondering if the same thought is going through Laura’s head.

Not that it matters.

She crosses her arms, leans against the wall and waits for Laura to make the first move.

“I know I’m still probably not someone you want to see,” Laura says, rubbing the back of her head with one hand and Danny doesn’t even have the words to describe the ways in which Laura is right and the ways she is wrong. “But my girlfriend has spent the last three days resolutely not speaking about whatever it is that’s obviously bothering her,” she says with a note of irritation entering her voice. “And I was hoping that you might be a little more amenable to reason.” She smiles up at Danny in what is probably supposed to a winning fashion and Danny feels something lurch inside her chest.

If things are bad enough that Laura’s worried… no, it probably just means Carmilla’s sulking after her scheme went down in flames. And when you’ve spent three hundred years being eighteen years old, three days probably seems like an utterly insignificant amount of time to be in a bad mood for even the most minor excuse.

“What makes you think that I would have any idea about what’s up with Elvira?” she says, parrying, instead.

Laura rolls her eyes. “Oh please, give me some credit. Ace investigative reporter in the making here.”

It’s Danny’s turn to look away. “Then you should know that whatever I do isn’t going to make a blind bit of difference.” She’s simply not important enough.

Laura moves around so she can look Danny in the face. “Can you give it a try? Please?”

It’s the last word that does it. That and the memory of the last time Laura asked for her help and was refused. Danny ducks her head briefly and sighs. “It’s not going to do any good.”

Laura practically bounces. “Thank you, Danny. Really.”

Danny pushes herself up off the wall. “No time like the present,” she says resignedly.

* * * * *

By the time that she’s arrived at Laura’s dorm, she’s more than ready to just turn about and walk away again. Her stomach’s already tied itself into knots and is working on tying *those* knots into larger knots. She has *no* idea what she’s supposed to say or do here.

She’s not even sure she can bring herself to look at Carmilla.

Quite frankly, the only thing keeping her moving forwards is the fact that Laura has positioned herself strategically behind her, as if she can sense Danny’s thoughts. And Danny can’t - quite - stomach turning around at this point and failing Laura, again.

LaFontaine’s in the corridor, looking like they’re coming from Perry’s room. They quirk their eyebrows at Danny. “Haven’t seen you around here in some time,” they say neutrally and somehow, *somehow*, it makes this easier to do.

Maybe it’s just that they’ve never been friends and, if nothing else, keeping cool in the face of opposition is something Danny’s always known how to do.

“I’ve been busy,” Danny says. “You know how it is.”

Lafontaine nods and then they’re past each other.

And then Danny’s at room 307. She glances back at Laura briefly, then opens the door.

It takes a moment for Danny’s eyes to adjust to the dimness, to be able to see a shape on Carmilla’s bed. She’s holding a book open in front of her, and Danny wonders how she’s able to read in this light. Benefits of the vampiric condition, she supposes.

“I’ll take it from here,” she says to Laura, then enters the room and closes the door behind her. Without even the light from the corridor, the room is even more shadowy. Her hand hovers over the light switch before moving away again.

Maybe this will be easier if she can’t see Carmilla clearly. She can’t see how it will be any harder.

First things first, though. She walks over to the desk. The light on the camera isn’t on, but she turns it around anyway. She considers the microphone for a moment before covering it with her jacket.

Whatever happens here, she has no desire for it to be recorded by Laura’s obsession with posterity or, worse, put on the net for everyone to see. Just the thought of Laura doing that, violating Danny’s privacy without her consent, ignites a flicker of anger in Danny’s chest and gives her the strength to turn back around to look at Carmilla’s bed.

“Well, I’m here,” she says. “Is there anything you’d like to say?”

There’s a movement from the bed - Danny thinks it might be Carmilla turning her head - and it’s only then that Danny realises quite how still Carmila’s been since she entered the room. And not her usual disinterested, relaxed, I-can’t-be-bothered-to-move stillness either. It has had the feel of a tense immanence, a waiting, of something ready to be broken.

“Why would I?” Camilla almost drawls. “It isn’t as though you being here is my idea.”

And, abruptly, Danny’s had enough. “If that’s all you’ve got,” she says, striding back across the room towards the door. “I guess I’ll take my leave.”

She had *known* that she wouldn’t be able to do anything.

“Stop,” Carmilla says quietly and Danny freezes, then slowly turns to face her. She almost says something, but waits instead, seeing if Carmilla has anything to add, anything to give her a reason to stay.

The tension in the room rise as the silence continues. Danny can’t move, can’t breathe, can’t even think. She’s on the edge of moving, of going to leave again, of doing *anything* that’d disrupt this awful stillness when Carmilla whispers, “I can’t remember the last time I had a friend *without* benefits.”

Danny gives a mirthless laugh. “Is that what we are?”

Carmilla moves her head again and her eyes gleam n the darkness. “I didn’t just keep coming around for your room’s colour scheme, Redwood,” Carmilla says drily.

“Oh,” Danny says as something starts to loosen within her, something hadn’t even realised had been so, so tight over the last few days. “I thought you just wanted to get me talking to Laura again. Which, mission accomplished apparently.”

“If only I had realised it’d be that simple.”

Danny laughs again, but this time it’s almost a proper laugh. “If only, huh?” She sobers and adds, “Don’t even think about trying that kind of manipulative bullshit on me again, dead girl, or I swear…”

Carmilla’s eyes tilt. “Does that mean I’m going to have the opportunity?” she asks in such an even voice that   
Danny’s sure it has to be forced.

But it doesn’t matter because the knot that’s busily unravelling inside Danny’s chest is such a relief that… that she’s almost ready to forgive Carmilla right about now. Even the pain that comes from realising, reaffirming, that Carmilla never saw her in any other way than platonic is almost alright, even if she’s not quite sure why.

She turns towards the door. “I guess you’ll have to find out the hard way,” she says and if it’s as good as a yes, she really doesn’t care.

“Turn the light on, will you?” Camilla asks with a rustle from behind her.

Danny sticks her finger up at her, but does it anyway.

“All yours,” she says to Laura, who’s apparently been hovering this whole time a little way down the corridor, and it only hurts a little.

Laura flashes her a smile as she bustles past. “Thank you,” she says. “We really must catch up at some point.”

Danny takes a breath and releases it. ‘Sure,” she says and she’s not sure whether or not Laura hears her.

Carmilla undoubtedly does.

* * * * *

There’s a knock at Danny’s door.

She wanders over and opens it to reveal Carmilla holding a pie in one hand, looking almost tentative?

She closes the door again, and stands there staring at it for a moment forcing her breath to remain level for absolutely no good reason whatsoever.

She opens it again. Carmilla’s still there, blank-faced, looking like she’s about one second from walking away. “Okay, haemophage, this is how it’s going to go. I’m going to close the door again, and then you’re going to breeze in. Because it’s just too damn weird you asking for permission. Got it?”

Carmilla stares at her flatly for a moment, then the corner of her mouth twitches. “Got it,” she drawls.

“Good,” Danny says and shuts the door again.

The door flies open almost instantly, only just missing Danny’s nose as she springs back. Carmilla struts in, a challenging gleam in her eye, and it’s just so annoyingly *hot* that it’s a good few seconds before her mind can kick in and tell her not to go there.

Too late, really.

She tears her eyes away and stalks over to the desk, just as if it’s any other day that Carmilla has turned up without so much as a by-your-leave. Just as if the situation’s absolutely normal.

It isn’t, of course, but at least she can try to pretend.

It’s only when she’s sat down that she realises the pie has somehow miraculously made its way onto her desk, which… How the hell did Carmilla do that?

For that matter… “Is this cafeteria pie?” she asks, swivelling around to cast a beady eye at the black clad miscreant on her bed. Because it looks like it. It even smells like it. But it’s not Wednesday and even sleight-of-pie tricks pale in comparison to the minor miracle that it exists at all.

Carmilla, naturally, just gives her a brief smirk before very deliberately producing a book from somewhere and opening it.

The rich aroma drifting upwards from the plate in front of her made her stomach rumble and she gave into the temptation to break off a piece with her fingers rather than fetch a fork from the drawer. It was still warm and gooey, and the flavour exploded on her tongue. It tasted so fresh that she wondered again at Carmilla’s resources and couldn’t stop a moan from drifting from her lips.

“Stop,” Carmilla said sardonically from behind her. “You’ll get me all hot and bothered.”

Suddenly the pie tastes of nothing so much as ashes and what she’s already swallowed weighs on her like rocks. She knows that these stupid, stupid feelings are ridiculously one-sided, that whatever is going through Carmilla’s mind is only whatever analogue for friendship she has - she’s told her as much - but it doesn’t help.

It’ll get better, she tells herself. It’ll get better.

It has to.

She pushes the plate away and twists around to look at Carmilla just in time to see a flash of something pass through her eyes.

“Sorry if it’s not up to the usual standards,” Carmilla drawls casually, almost exaggeratedly so. “I sometimes forget that not everyone enjoys the extra tang that terror can add to a dish.”

Danny thinks about asking, seriously thinks about it, but decides that some things are quite probably left uninvestigated. Besides she thinks, with a feeling of sharp regret, that fleeting look of Carmilla’s might actually have been hurt. As impossible as Carmilla would doubtless like everyone else to think that circumstance to be.

Which… well, great.

“I was just thinking…” she temporises, then a flash of inspiration hits her. “I guess I was just thinking that since it is to yours, you might like to share the pie with me.”

There’s another flash of something, before Carmilla allows a smirk to spread across her face. “That would rather necessitate you finding another fork and plate in this place,” she says and her smile turns sharp. “Unless you’d like to share, of course. Would you like to feed me personally, Everest?”

Danny has to close her eyes, clench her hands, drive her nails into her palms before she can answer that. Because her first, and second, and third, impulse to answer that in a wholly inappropriate way. Either that or burst into tears. Because while she’s mostly sure that Carmilla doesn’t mean to hurt her, it doesn’t change the fact that the way she’s acting feels like it’s driving nails into Danny’s chest.

It isn’t Carmilla’s fault, not really, but that still isn’t helping one bit.

When she opens her eyes again, Carmilla’s smile has faded, becoming almost fixed and if Danny is any judge of Carmilla, any judge at all, she’d say that Carmilla’s maybe half a second from exiting the room and maybe only coming back at around two seconds from never.

Which… “Do you honestly think I don’t have plates and cutlery of my own around here?” she manages, a weak rejoinder at best.

“Sure,” Carmilla says, almost muttering. “But clean?” Well, at least Danny isn’t the only one feeling off her game.

Danny rolls her eyes and grabs a plate, knife and fork from a drawer. She’s always considered having her own cutlery a basic survival strategy for university. She slices off half the pie and hands it to Carmilla, who sniffs at it suspiciously.

“You do realise that my sense of smell is far better than that of a human,” she says.

Danny stares at her hard for a moment, then flips her finger at Carmilla. “Fuck off and die,” she says conversationally.

Camilla bares disgustingly pie-stained teeth in what could be mistaken by the uninitiated as a grin. “Already tried that one. Didn’t stick,” she says.

Danny sighs in a put-upon way and turns back to her plate. But suddenly it’s a lot easier to face the rest of Carmilla’s gift.

* * * * *

“Looking a bit more chipper this morning,” Hannah says, jostling her in a friendly fashion as they make their way out of the dining hall after breakfast a few days later.

Danny casts her a wary eye. “Are you trying to insinuate that I don’t *always* look as fresh as a daisy first thing in the morning?”

“Not at all,” Hannah says, then smirks. “I just wondered if it had anything to do with a certain someone’s visit yesterday?”

Danny resists the urge to wince. Yesterday… hadn’t been bad, for all that both of them were obviously tiptoeing around the other, for all that Carmilla had done her best to hide whatever awkwardness she had under her usual shell of just not giving a shit.

But Hannah’s unintended reminder that she was unattractive enough not to even be on Carmilla’s radar doesn’t exactly help, for all that Danny’s trying her best to bury those feelings.

“How are things with you?” she asks.

Hannah takes a beat too long to be at all convincing that she doesn’t know what Danny’s speaking about. “I’m good,” she says, but her smile’s a little fixed. “Listen, maybe it would be best if you could have a word with Chloe about, y’know.”

Danny holds in a sigh, but nods. Maybe she’d get further with Chloe this time.

* * * * *

“If you want to help me, get Hannah to talk to you about her problems,” Chloe snaps. “It isn’t as though she doesn’t look up to you enough.”

Danny doesn’t quite roll her eyes. Well this is going nowhere fast.

* * * * *

Carmilla doesn’t say anything when Danny de-stresses to her about overly stubborn sisters of the Summer Society - probably wisely - but her eyes are entirely far too amused for Danny’s liking.

It’s still awkward. Carmilla still says, does things that Danny has to remind herself, keep on reminding herself, that she doesn’t mean, and Danny… Danny still sometimes can’t help putting her foot in it every now and again.

But, still, it’s slowly getting better. Still slowly moving to something else, something that is still slowly becoming visible in the mist that is their relationship, even if Danny still isn’t quite sure what that is.

And still…


	5. Chapter 5

In the end, it isn’t anything that big at all that sets her off. It’s Carmilla brushing a little closer than her has to as she enters Danny’s room, just a little nearer than a friend would. It’s nothing, really, in the grand scheme of things. Certainly nothing compared the other liberties that Carmilla has taken with her person, that Danny has had to force herself to ignore.

But it’s after a night of too broken and too little sleep, after more coursework crammed into too short a space of time, and it’s after too long a time since Danny’s been able to get out of her room and stretch her legs with a proper run, which always leaves her feeling irritable.

So it isn’t actually that big, but it certainly feels that way as Danny’s temper finally frays. “God, Carmilla,” she practically snarls. “Haven’t you ever heard of personal space?”

Carmilla’s slink judders for a moment, but she doesn’t look back, doesn’t speak, doesn’t give any other indication of what’s she’s thinking.

It’s possibly a mistake, as there’s absolutely nothing to stem the words coming out of Danny’s mouth. “No. Of course not. Because why would Carmilla, queen of all she fucking surveys, be bothered by what effect she has on anyone else?” There’s a moment where Danny almost manages to stop herself there, but then her mouth opens again with a sensation like she’s going over a cliff. “No wonder you can’t keep anything you aren’t fucking.”

Carmilla spins around and, for a moment, her eyes are raw and vulnerable before the shields go up again and she’s just smirking impenetrably. Her eyes flicker towards the door before focussing back on Danny and the smirk sharpens, becomes a blade.

“Is that what you want, beansprout?” she drawls huskily as she sways towards Danny. “Me fucking you?”

Danny feels her face prickle as it seems caught between wanting to flush and having the blood drain away. She doesn’t know which impulse wins, doesn’t know anything apart from that she can’t look away and really wants to, that this is something between dream and nightmare, and she’s tending much towards the latter.

Carmilla’s less than an arm length away - one of her arms at that - and with a fire in her eyes that Danny hasn’t seen since the days of their ill-advised Laura inspired feuding when she stops, and something in her face wavers. “You want me,” she says, somehow managing to make the words sound like a curse.

It’s enough to break whatever spell Danny is under, and she looks away, face flushing, feeling wretched, ashamed and sick. “I don’t want to,” she manages.

“You want me,” Carmilla repeats, as if it explains everything.

“Maybe I wouldn’t if you didn’t keep on goddamn flirting with me,” Danny snarls, the anger giving her the strength to look back up at Carmilla.

“Like I’d ever flirt with you, Redwood,” Carmilla snaps back, and that hurts more than it should, quenches the anger under its cold weight.

“Yeah,” Danny says quietly. “That’s what I thought.” Carmilla looks at her with stricken eyes, but Danny shrugs it off. “That’s why it took a while to register what you were doing, with the disregard for personal boundaries, the touching, the looking, the gifts. They might lead a girl to think certain thoughts, if she didn’t know better.”

And maybe even if she did, she adds to herself.

For a moment, it looks like Carmilla is actually going to say something in response, but then she’s walking out of the door before Danny can really react.

Danny sinks back into her chair, shaking slightly. She has no idea how that went, no idea if she’ll even see Carmilla again except in passing, but, maybe, it needed to be said. She certainly feels… emptier for having it out there.

Still, it’s a relief when an hour later she gets a text from Carmilla: _When, where and how would you suggest me meet?_ Followed swiftly by _Since apparently you think me completely incapable of making these decisions myself_.

She can’t help grinning and texts back: _You’re giving me an option? Who are you, and what have you done with Carmilla?_

* * * * *

Carmilla tensely sits down opposite her, drink in hand but making absolutely no move to drink it. “So you thought a bar was the best venue for this meeting?” she asks skeptically.

Danny shrugs and takes a sip of her beer. Honestly, it does work for her. She doesn’t associate the campus bar with dates, just meeting up with mates for some cheap alcohol. And the table between them gives Danny some much needed distance, and the noise and furore doesn’t allow Danny to forget for a second that this is anything but an intimate setting. 

Carmilla looks around with one disdainful eyebrow raised, and Danny can’t help but wonder what she’s thinking of, what she’s seen between the walls. What she’s done, too, but Danny tries not to dwell on that.

“So.“ Carmilla finally says. “We were here to talk, I thought.” Her tone is neutral, but the fact that she’s the first to speak…

Well, it means something, even if Danny isn’t precisely sure what.

She takes another sip to fortify herself before answering. “I’m sorry,” she says, looking anywhere but at Carmilla. “I just… When you first started imposing yourself upon me, I really had no idea what you were up to. But you never mentioned Laura, and if you weren’t trying to sweep me off my feet, you gave a really good impression of it.” She bites her lip. “I mean, obviously you weren’t. Obviously. But you managed to fool the rest of Summer Soc into thinking that’s what you were doing, and somewhere along the line…” She takes a gulp of beer rather than continue.

“So that’s why you hang around with me?” Carmilla says tonelessly. “You’re hoping to get into my pants.”

Danny can’t help her eyes focussing on where those pants would be if the table wasn’t in the way, and flushes before looking up at Carmilla. “What?” she says. “No! That’s… I mean, once I found out what was going on, everything made a lot more sense. “ Certainly more sense than Carmilla being interested in her. “I like you *despite* these…” she waves a hand in the air, “feelings. Not because of them. If I only liked you that way,” she points in the direction of Carmilla’s pants, “I’d have just cut off contact after it became clear about you and Laura.” She tries a smile on for size. “All evidence aside, I’m not *that* much of a masochist. I just wish…” she sighs, “I know it’s probably just the way you are, but you don’t make it easy on a girl.”

Carmilla studies her for a minute, an unreadable expression on her face. “What do you mean?”

“What do I mean by what?”

“That I don’t make it easy on you.”

Danny chews the inside of her mouth, then shrugs. “The intense looks, the way you seem to like coming too close. The touching doesn’t help. Even the gifts. I mean they’re nice,” she says, and cursing inwardly, feels herself blush. “But they’re… *nice*.”

“The gifts were your idea,” Carmilla immediately says, accusingly.

Danny blinks. “They were?”

“You’d gotten one of your friends a present. It seemed like a good idea, so I stole it.”

“Oh,” Danny says, searching her memory, but coming up blank. It must have been for a birthday or something. “Well, the other things…”

“What do you want me to do, just ignore you?” Carmilla asks, a hint of frustration in her eyes.

“You seem to do that half the time anyway,” Danny says. It’s actually one of the things that Danny likes about her, the way that they can just exist in the same room without Danny feeling like she needs to focus on her. “As for the rest of it… maybe you could just tone things down a bit?”

Carmilla just looks at her.

Danny sighs. Out of everything that might happen tonight, she had somehow never expected that it might come down to remedial lessons on how to act around people whose bones you don’t want to jump. “Lesson one,” she says. “Personal space: Learn how to love it…”

* * * * *

“I’m glad we’re able to do this again,” Laura says, practically curled around her cup of hot chocolate.

Danny waits a moment, but doesn’t feel anything apart from the dull shame that doesn’t seem to be in a hurry to go anywhere anytime soon. Maybe it helps that their chairs aren’t arranged around the circular table in anything that might possibly resemble a date position - they’re not facing each other, but nor are they huddled up close. More of a 120 degree arc.

Maybe that helps, but Danny doesn’t think that they need it anymore. It probably says something that her only impulse upon seeing Laura with a cream moustache is to take a picture with her phone for later blackmail. If she’s feeling really cruel, she’ll send a copy to Carmilla for her disposal.

It’s still not exactly easy - the conversation doesn’t flow anywhere near as easily as it used to. But she’s trying and Laura is too.

It possibly helps that if Laura is busy risking her life these days she isn’t telling Danny about it.

“What?” she asks blandly. “Have you missed cadging free hot chocolates off unsuspecting third years?”

Laura looks at her for a moment consideringly, before pouting exaggeratedly and kicking her ankle.

“Help,” Danny replies instantly. “I’m being abused.”

Laura hides her smile in her drink, earning herself a dot of cream on the end of her nose. “But seriously,” she says. “You didn’t have to.”

“But I had almost earned my next free cup of coffee. How could I resist that siren lure?”

“Just so long as you know I *will* pay you back.”

Danny bites back on her initial response and takes a sip of her coffee instead. “How *is* life with Carmilla, then?”

Laura ducks her head and *glows*. “It’s good,” she says, and Danny feels a dull ache. Not that she’s jealous of what Laura has with Carmilla - well, she’s trying her best not to be, at any rate - but more of having that kind of connection in general.

It’a stupid and irrational and so, so human, but luckily it doesn’t stop her also feeling happy for Laura. For Carmilla, too, much as she’s fairly sure that Carmilla would decry any chink of humanity in her armour of indifference.

“Sickening, Hollis, completely sickening,” she tells her.

Laura bites her lip, looks down then back up again. “Would you believe I was jealous of you for a while?”

Danny blinks. “Jealous? Of what?”

Laura gives her an embarrassed smile. “Your friendship with Carmilla.”

“What?’

Laura shrugs, blushing. “It’s just… You know her. Carm isn’t exactly great at sharing much of anything about herself.”

“Unless you tie her up for nine days or so,” Danny can’t help interjecting.

Laura somehow manages to blush even brighter. “Um, yes, well, apart from that.” 

“Jealousy,” she prompts after Laura seems stuck in a place Danny isn’t comfortable prying into just yet.

Maybe later, when their friendship has stabilised a little more.

Laura gives her a grateful look. “It was ridiculous. I mean, it isn’t as though I can say she isn’t affectionate, but sometimes… She just shuts down on me. Won’t talk to me. Disappears. At first she wouldn’t even tell me where she went when she was in those moods. I finally managed to pry out of her that she went to see you.” She ducks her head again. “I… didn’t take it that well initially.”

“That well?” Danny prompts after a few moments.

“There may have been screaming fight which I picked where I demanded to know what she thought she could talk to you about which she couldn’t share with me.”

Danny blinks. “You do know that it isn’t exactly like the dead girl and I sit around having deep and meaningful conversations?”

“Really?” Laura asks, seeming to perk up a little.

“Mostly we just sarcastically snipe at each other.” Danny almost adds ‘Unless that’s just Carmilla’s way of flirting with me’ but then doesn’t. She’s not ready to go there just yet, not even joking, not even with someone who isn’t Carmilla.

Certainly not with Carmilla’s girlfriend of all people.

“I thought it was probably something like that,” Laura says.

“Why?” Danny asks, a little suspiciously. “What did Carmilla say?”

“Um,” Laura says, glancing away “Maybe you’d be better off asking Carmilla that question.”

* * * * *

Danny’s phone buzzes with a text from Carmilla: _Heading over now_. It isn’t exactly a question but Danny still responds with a quick _Sure_ just to be on the safe side. She’s not quite certain what to do with this new Carmilla, one who actually seems to have some consideration, but she’s adapting.

She can’t help but suspect that this new leaf Carmilla’s turned over won’t exactly last long, though. But maybe she’s being a bit too cynical.

Carmilla blows into the room without knocking, which is at least a breath of fresh air, and saunters over to the bed, giving Danny a couple of almost cautious looks as she does so. They’re a bit too long and not nearly casual enough to be glances, but neither are they the almost smouldering looks that Carmilla used to aim at her on occasion. Danny can’t help but wonder if these halfway house looks feel as awkward to Carmilla as they do to her.

But it’s alright to be awkward, just at the moment. They’re both still finding their feet after Danny’s revelation. And even with the… deliberateness of their interactions, it feels good to have Carmilla just… there.

“Afternoon, evening-walker,” Danny drawls, and smirks a little as Carmilla raises her finger as she settles down with a book, obviously ignoring her.

Danny makes a note of the time, then forces herself to go back to studying. If she’s even got a hope of getting any answer out of Carmilla about the arguments with Laura, she’s going to have to wait until Carmilla’s settled. Besides, it’ll be nice to have Carmilla around that long before things go tits-up. Even if her curiosity is gnawing at her.

Half an hour later, after staring at her computer screen blankly for the last five minutes, she’s had enough. Turning around, she opens her mouth and…

“Finally decided to talk about whatever’s had you squirming ever since I walked in?” Carmilla asks, smoothly interrupting her without even looking up from her book.

“I hate you,” Danny says cordially. Okay, so maybe she hasn’t been as subtle as she could have been.

“Overjoyed to hear it,” Carmilla says, then waits a beat. “So?”

“This would be so much easier if you hadn’t thrown me off my stride.”

Carmilla finally glances over at her and smirks with malice aforethought. “Why do you think I did it?”

“I *really* hate you,” Danny grouses, then closes her eyes for a moment to centre herself. “Okay,” she says, opening them again. “Laura said that you’d had some arguments.”

Carmilla tenses visibly and looks back at her book. “Had, past. We’re good now.”

“Apparently when she asked you what you could to talk to me about that you couldn’t tell her, you had a response.”

“Did she tell you what that response was?” Carmilla asks, staring at the book as if it holds the answers to this conversation.

“No.”

“Maybe you should listen to her, then.”

“She suggested that I talk to you.”

Carmilla dropped the book into her lap and clenched one hand before relaxing it. “Maybe I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Okay,” Danny says. “Okay. I’m not going to pry if you don’t want me to.” She’s a little surprised to find that she means it. Not that she’s ever been at Laura levels of curiosity, but…

If Carmilla doesn’t feel the need to share whatever it is, Danny’s willing to trust her on it.

Carmilla picks her book back up and Danny turns back around to her computer.

It’s five minutes later when Carmilla speaks, “You don’t have any expectations of me.”

Danny blinks, thrown a little, and turns around. “What?”

“That’s what I told her.” Carmilla looks up from her book and arches an eyebrow. “You’re relaxing to be around. You don’t have any expectations of me.”

Danny frowns. “That’s it?’

“That’s it.”

“Then why wouldn’t she just tell me that?” The answer seems innocuous, hardly the kind of thing Laura would feel the need to keep from her.

“Because, Laura being Laura, she didn’t stop there.”

“What-“ Danny stops, thinking it through. “She asked why you couldn’t just relax around her, that she didn’t have any expectations of you either.”

Carmilla shrugs, nods.

“Didn’t go well?”

“I made the mistake of answering. Apparently telling her that sometimes it feels like she’s made of nothing but expectations was not the correct answer.”

Danny flinches. “Yeah, I can see that.”

“I… care for her. I do. But it’s also a set of entanglements, of chains…” Carmilla looks back towards the book. “Sometimes I just need to get away.”

“I’m almost surprised you don’t just spend it by yourself.”

Carmilla gives her a long look. “So am I.”

Danny almost blushes and isn’t quite sure why. It doesn’t *feel* like a resurgence of the crush, but… She gives up and just smiles at Carmilla, before looking slight panicked as realisation strikes. “Um, just so you know, I wasn’t trying to put pressure on you just then.”

Camilla rolls her eyes before focussing her attention back on her book. “Like you could if you tried,” she murmurs and, somehow, she manages to make it sound like a compliment.

* * * * *

Some days, her relationship with Chloe seems like it’s almost returned to what it was before the night in the basement. Other days it’s considerably worse. Sometimes, it’s almost like Chloe hates her.

Today is definitely tending to that last category.

“You wouldn’t understand,” Chloe almost spits. “You’re far too perfect for that.”

The subject is, of course, Hannah, like it always is when Chloe gets this defensive. Never Chloe herself. Chloe still hasn’t talked about that. Danny tries to be there for her, to absorb the anger as best she can.

It’s what she deserves.

Today, though, she feels something break within herself, and she’s torn between laughter and tears.

“I’m not perfect,” she says quietly.

Chloe laughs harshly. “Trust me, I’m fully aware of *that*.” She whirls, but before she can stalk off, Danny grabs her.

“No,” she says. “I don’t think you do.”

Fear flickers beneath the anger on Chloe’s face. If it comes down to a fight, neither one of them are in any doubt as to who would win.

“It’s my fault that we were down there that night,” Danny says. “It’s my fault that the Summer Society didn’t listen to Laura before, and start the search before the vampires had all gathered. It’s my fault that some of our own almost died.”

Chloe looks up at her defiantly. “So boo hoo hoo, you’re a crappy leader. But you haven’t had to deal with the aftermath. You haven’t had to deal with waking up night after night because… because your roommate is having nightmares. You don’t know what it’s like to…” She breaks the gaze, closes her eyes. “You don’t know… You don’t have to deal with the blood. You don’t know what it’s like to feel like you’re just not sure that you carry on,” she says in almost a whisper. “You’re far too strong for that,” and she looks up with something that’s a mixture of despair and envy.

Danny steps back and this time she’s the one who has to close her eyes. “You’re wrong about that too,” she says. “I… In the aftermath, after everything had settled, after… after the fact that Carmilla had died due to my stupidity really hit me, I did… something stupid to try and get her back.” She pauses, take a breath then carries on. “It worked, but that wasn’t really the point. I… I knew it had a good chance of killing me, succeed or fail, and I just didn’t care.” She shakes her head. “No, I almost wanted that to happen. I thought… I thought that my inaction had cost Carmilla her life, and…” She shrugs. She can’t believe how messed up in the head she had been. It had all seemed to make sense at the time, but… She couldn’t believe that she’d made Kirsch party to her almost suicide. She opens her eyes to see Chloe, looking back at her pale and shocked and suddenly not angry in the slightest. She gives her a painful smile. “So if you think that I’m strong, you’re wrong. If you think I didn’t break, well…” She heaves a sigh. “And if you think I haven’t had the nightmares about the blood in the basement, you\re wrong there too.”

“Danny…” Chloe says in a wet distressed voice.

Danny shakes her head. “But that’s enough about me. What about you?”

It’s like Chloe’s strings have been cut and she slumps to the ground against the wall. She swallows. “I dreamt I was back there again last night,” she whispers and doesn’t flinch when Danny wraps an arm around her.

* * * * *

**Epilogue**

The first warning Danny has of Carmilla’s presence is a hand ruffling her hair. Danny ducks out of the way with an annoyed grunt, but Carmilla smoothly steps back before she can retaliate.

“Here,” she says, throwing an opened envelope at Danny’s head. “Catch.”

“Someone’s feeling obnoxious today,” Danny mutters as she opens the letter. It’s been months since the tall about what just friends can and can’t do and for the last few weeks, casual physical contact has been back on the can list. Danny can’t say that she’s complaining too much. She thinks that she almost might have missed it. She looks back up at Carmilla, grinning. “This is an acceptance letter for that doctoral program.”

“Apparently your busy-bodying paid off,” Carmilla says in a bored tone, but there’s a hint of a smile on her lips.

“I’ll look forward to hearing about the adventures of Dr Carnstein.”

“I’ll have to get through it first. I hear I’m not even allowed to disembowel my advisor.”

“It is frowned upon,” Danny agrees.

Hannah bursts in. “Hey Danny-“ She stops. “Oh, if I’ve known you were with your fake girlfriend…”

Camilla, who had buried her head in a book in the time the door had taken to open - probably just so she could maintain her an air of bored disaffectedness - sticks her finger up at Hannah.

“Stop antagonising my fake girlfriend,” Danny says, and Carmilla gives her the same treatment.

Hannh smirks unrepentantly. “Just wanted to know if you were up for coming out tonight,” she says to Danny. She’s looking much better these days, the slightly brittle look gone from her eyes. Once Danny had convinced Chloe to talk, Hannah had fallen quickly. And they’d helped. They’d helped each other.

They may not be quite there yet, but they were getting there.

Danny takes a moment to consider. On the one hand, she had more work to do. She *always* had more work to do. But on the other…

“Oh, what the heck,” she sighs. “I need a break. Dead girl, you coming with?”

“I’d rather stick red hot needles in my eyes,” Carmilla says.

“So that’d be a maybe.”

Hannah nods. “See you at the campus bar at seven,” she says, then whirls out of the room.

“That girl,” Carmilla says, looking up from her book, “Has entirely too much energy.”

“Do you think Laura would be interested in coming out?”

Carmilla affixes her with a look. “Why don’t you text her and see?”

Danny, smiling, does just that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think it says something deep and meaningful about me that the one fandom I seem to be really bad about writing femslash for is the one where said romantic relationships are very much canon. On the other hand, it isn't as though this story wasn't rich in relationships between women, I guess.


End file.
